Ike got depressed and then tried to kill me.

Long after Ike had been downgraded to a "tropical depression" it decided to shimmy its way up the midwest and fuck a bunch of people who didn't deserve it. The bulk of it passed right over Indianapolis, Chicago, Milwaukee, and Western Michigan. People in those areas got a lot of rain and a hell of a thunderstrom, I think, but I don't know that they got anything like what we got here in Southwestern Ohio. Nearly (or maybe over) a million people in SW Ohio are without power after nearly 16 hours of sustained winds, which reached tornado proportions (without the tornado), and took off with anything not nailed down. Trees and parts of trees are everywhere. Telephone poles, street lamps, and billboards everywhere are just blown over. Nothing hit them. They just blew away. I've seen a few roofless buildings (including the main building where our storage warehouse is located), a few tipped over cars/trucks, a tipped over boat still strapped to its trailer, a few stoplights blown hundreds of feet clear of the intersections they once governed, a crap load of accidents caused by stupid people who don't realize you are supposed to stop at intersections where the traffic lights aren't working, and my boss saw a Cesna upside down on the ground in Springboro. Throughout it all I've noticed one consistent thing that is irksome but also hilarious. Apparently people from Ohio don't think high winds are dangerous unless there's an actual tornado warning. They will happily stand outside with their hands shielding their eyes to gawk and wonder at the carnage as tree branches as big as my van threaten to pass me on the highway and roofing shingles whip around their scalps like pissed off Apache. Apparently, as long as the sky is blue and the sun is shining they don't think the flying cows and flailing power lines are signs that they should get their hayseed asses to shelter.

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